Polkadot ecosystem, the Ethereum’s Contender - Crypto Academy / S4W7 - Homework Post for @allbert

POLKADOT ECOSYSTEM (POLKERSTARTER)
CHOOSE A PROJECT, PLATFORM OR SERVICE BELONGING TO THE POLKADOT ECOSYSTEM (POLKADOT NOT PERMITTED) AND MAKE A DETAILED POST.

INTRODUCTION:

Polkadot is a cryptocurrency built on the blockchain technology, which implies it is right to say without the presence or existence of the blockchain technology, it is impossible to have the polkadot ecosystem built i.e. The idea behind blockchain birthed cryptocurrency, which further buttress the fact that blockchain technology is an integral factor to the existence of polkadot and other cryptocurrency.

BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY:

Before diving deep into what blockchain is, it is important to identify a few myths behind it. There’s quite a reasonable amount of the general populace who sees the blockchain technology as a technology that just came out of the blues and suddenly became popular. To others it’s a complicated and complex industry that can’t be understood or understood only by the wealthy or to those who owns or regulate the system. While to some, when they hear the word blockchain, all they think of are Bitcoin and its price going up.
I counter all of these claims and I will also proffer what I term to be fact, as a result of the fact that it’s proven; here are some of the factors that counter the myth
The blockchain technology didn’t blow out of the blues as people think. For a matter of fact, it goes way back; it existed centuries ago in the year 1991, when it was first created by two researchers known as “Straut Haber” and “W.Scott Stornetta”.
The idea behind blockchain being too big to understand is a myth; this is because blockchain is easier to understand beyond the seeming technicalities involved. It is also not too big to understand or ambiguous. For a matter of fact, it is easy to comprehend and practice.
Just like every other product had intent, blockchain had a reason for its establishment; bitcoin is one of its products, and blockchain is way beyond the price of bitcoin going higher.

WHAT IS BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY?

To not complicate the concept of Blockchain, I’ll make it simple. A Blockchain is simply a register of transactions also known as a chain of blocks; so basically it’s a ledger. Although this ledger is a public ledger, which means the whole world can see all transactions and you can’t alter it. Even though you can see all transactions, the parties to these transactions can be anonymous.

HOW DOES CRYPTOCURRENCY RELATE TO A BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY?

It’s that simple, cryptocurrency are a series of numbers stored on a computer in the form of chains of blocks, the process let’s take an example to explain this; take a database, allow anyone to make changes to this database on the sole condition of declaring themselves a “member”. Set up a very long and very complex control procedure which must be carried out each time a certain number (block) of changes is requested. This procedure is carried out not by single controller but by all the voluntary “members”. Once validated, the “block” of changes is dated and added to the others in the registry. Finally, let everyone read the registry, and you have a block chain database. Thus, it is up to the network (all the peers) to validate and confirm each transaction. This technology and this system are the basis of the vast majority of cryptocurrency such as Polkadot (DOT), Ethereum etc.

POLKADOT:

Polkadot is referred to be the blockchain of blockchains, this is because of its major function which is to connect blockchains in a multi network, while enabling them communicate and pool security. The polkadot blockchain has an internal token which is known as “DOT”.
Now remember Polkadot is a blockchain of blockchains, and its network helps to connect the dots with all other networks. This implies, it gives room for other blockchain projects to exist. For the purpose of this assignment, “Polkastarter” will be picked as the subject topic, as it is a platform belonging to the Polkadot ecosystem, and it’s of interest to me due to certain reasons I will be sharing later in this assignment.

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QUESTION 1.

EXPLAIN IN YOUR OWN WORDS WHY YOU CHOSE IT (POLKASTARTER) AND WHY DO YOU THINK POLKASTARTER IS RELEVANT TO THE WORLD?

POLKASTARTER:
Well, it’s been an interesting journey thus far with Polkadot, and as we all must have known by now Polkastarter belongs to the Polkadot ecosystem. Now for a more defined explanation what is Polkastarter itself?
Polkastarter is known to be a Polkadot based decentralized exchange platform which is designed to support cross chain token pools and auction. What this simply means is Polkastarter provides an easy to use launchpad that gives investors the opportunity to securely purchase tokens without risks, since swaps are automatically executed by smart contracts, and new projects can easily raise the capital they need to launch and also further their development.

WHY HAVE I CHOSEN POLKERSTARTER?

I chose Polkastarter because of some reasons I will be sharing below, these reasons are;
I find the technology behind its existence interesting; they are empowering projects to launch decentralized and interoperable token pools and auctions. Indeed their use case is an interesting and captivating one.
This in turns enables backers secure early access to crypto innovation entirely, because the problem of how to launch, where to launch is solved and the capital required for development is provided through token pools and auctions. When this problem is solved, it brings about an increase in the adoption of this blockchain and it therefore results to an increase in cash flow to the ecosystem and the overall crypto market environment. Hence, I chose this because I see a future in it.

I chose this because it offers decentralization functions/features. The original idea for blockchain from the founding fathers is to foster decentralization and eliminate the middle men factor. Thereby giving end users the complete control over the value they own, this means there’s no third party who owns your value or can limit your access to it, which allows full transparency.

It is currently undervalued, which implies it is yet to blow up, that is when compared to past record of products that offer close or similar functions. After launching late last year, december 2020. It has grown to become a reputable platform for Initial Dex offerings (IDOs), with a total market cap less than 300 million, total supply of 100 million and a current market price less than $3. If I must say, a utility token that offers an exceedingly awesome usecase as this, with an amazing tokenomics is a perfect determinant to picking a project to invest in, plus the fact that it’s from a good ecosystem. These are added factors to determining the long term possibility of an ecosystem.

The Polkastarter ecosystem roadmap is focused on long term vision. They have stayed true to providing excellent service and improving user experience by incorporating and partnering with reputable projects that are in tandem with their long term vision. Here is a list of their current partners;

• Moonbean Network.
• Shyft Network.
• Covalent.
• Orion Protocol.
• Decentralized Information Asset.

These are the reasons I chose Polkastarter, and I hope the information above has given you a wider understanding of the reason I chose it and ast the same time convince you that this is good project worthy of investment.

WHY DO I THINK POLKASTARTER IS RELEVANT TO THE WORLD?

Here are some of the reasons I think Polkastarter is relevant to the world;
The fact that Polkastarter offers fixed swap smart contract, that in turn empower projects to easily launch liquidity pool that execute orders at fixed price brings about innovation to the technology space, and this allows direct peer to peer cryptocurrency transactions to take place online securely and without the need of an intermediary. This alone brings about innovation and improves user experience in the blockchain technology space.

Polkastarter is relevant to the world because it is aimed at encouraging the adoption of cryptocurrency, the friendly and easy to use interface encourages more people to use this, thereby bringing about an increase in cashflow within the blockchain technology space.

The technology behind Polkastarter encourages and provides start up/new projects the avenue to raise capital.This alone will foster development in both the immediate macro environment and as well as the micro environment, which also encourages more startups to not fold and increase their life span by helping them recreate their strategy achieving long term vision.

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QUESTION 2

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT (POLKASTARTER), AND ITS PLATFORM.

We have spoken about Polkastarter since inception of this assignment; with no exception I’ll talk about it once more and its platform, with screenshots to further buttress my points on this.

WHAT DOES THE POLKASTARTER PLATFORM DO?

The Polkastarter platform serves as a decentralized crowd funding launchpad for up and coming crypto projects to raise capital and build a dedicated community. It is as simple as that, and the native utility token for Polkastarter is POLS.

The POLS token is one that addresses or serves many purpose such as the payment of transaction fees, it is also issued for DAO (Decentralized autonomy organization) i.e. used for community governance. The POLS users are also opportune to earn rewards through or by providing liquidity on the Uniswap platform by staking POLS. Rewards in this case are earned based on a percentage of the transaction fees.
To take a deep dive into how this works;
POLS token are used to gain early access to token pools on Polkastarter through staking. So this means, without having a POLS token in your wallet, you cannot partake in this process. Also, before one can take part in staking, one has to first provide liquidity before being able to stake POLS and earn rewards as a result of it. So that means for one to successfully stake a POLS token, it is a must to first provide liquidity first, after then staking can take place.
Screenshots are shown below to illustrate the Staking process and preocedure

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QUESTION 3

WHAT ARE THE FUNCTIONALITIES AND REAL LIFE APPLICATION OF POLKASTARTER?

I feel like I have touched quite a sizable amount of the answer to this question in previous question, but I also will be emphasizing more on this. I believe by now we understood what Polkastarter is all about, which simply is to empower projects to launch decentralized and interoperable token pools and auctions
The functionalities of Polkastarter and its real life application are as follows;

• The Polkastarter platform enables projects to raise capital; with Polkastarter, projects (in specific decentralized projects) will be opportune to raise and exchange capital freely, at a cheap rate and through a fast method or approach.
  A major challenge facing startups is capital, providing an opportunity that helps start ups raise capital is a step ahead to solving a major industry and technology problem. With this in phase, we can expect to see a huge increase in the adoption of decentralized finance, thereby bringing about an increase in cash flow. This is what innovation is, and with this in phase a major problem of start ups are solved.

• The Polkstarter enables or solves the problem of scalability; for a layman understanding, scalability is the property of a system to handle a growing amount of work by adding resources to the system. Users usually experience inefficiency in the performance of a system when changes occur on it, for instance a system experiences an increases in demand or adoption when compared to its usual. When this happens it results to delayed transaction, increase in network fee as a result of congestion, all of these sums up to result to inefficiency in a system, thereby creating a negative user experience. Polkastarter solves the problem of scalability and its used asa gateway for fast and cheap transactions.

• A major functionality of Polkastarter is the possibility of making cross chain swaps, and a user friendly interface; This is what enables or ensures the smooth interoperability between various networks. We can all agree that with this in view, it further strengthens the opportunity for a fast and easy transaction and this is what users want, a stress free process with an easy to user interface or design.
  We can all agree that this Functionalities and real life applications contribute immensely to the growth and adoption of decentralized finance (Defi).

• The functionality of polkastarter as to real life applications includes the possibility of Auction in the ecosystem: It innovated the process of auctioning and bidding a by including dutch and sealed bid aauctions in token pools.

• Polkastarter serves in the building stronger security within its ecosystem, by introducing a closed OTC deals with password protection. With this, it further strengthens users confidence in carrying out transactions and further boosts their confidence in carrying out transactions.

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QUESTION 4

WHAT ARE THE FUTURE DEVELOPMENT AND ASSOCIATED PROJECTS FOR POLKASTARTER?

Well before I go into this, I need to commend the developers of Polkastarter, these guys know their onions and I can only say the sky is their starting point. For a new project that commenced December, 2020. I will say they have done exceedingly, and permit me to say this is just the beginning of greater things for them.
They have recently announced a successful upgrade to their Initial Dex offering platform – Polkastarter V2 and quite a number of updates to their platform. This updates are aimed at improving overall user experience, streamline UI and offer new opportunities, which would encourage users to engage more deeply with the platform. Here is a list of some of these updates;

• A new Dashboard
• A streamlined whitelisting process
• A new peoject page
• Staking opportunities
• IDO farming.

In their first year of operation, they have successfully brought over 70 blockchain projects to the crypto market, which has been valued to be over $1.5billion.

In the future Polkastaqrter will be one of the most highly valued ecosystem aqnd this is becaqsue of wqhatq they aqrehaqveaqndaqre planning for long term development, which includes;

1.Partnerships: Polkastarter is integrating an effective and positive approach into their business modeling through partnerships. These Partnerships would in turn yield an increase in the value they offer and ensure the smooth sail for each transaction carried out by end users. We have seen quite a sizable amount of partnership between Polkastarter and other tech brands in this year, and they still have a whole lot of partnerships coming in the coming years as they’ve stated in their whitepaper.

2.Upgrades: In the last year, we have seen the introduction of Polkastarter V2, which brought about new updates and upgrading in the Polkastarterecosystem, and as of this reason we saw the implementation of a new dashboard, a streamlined whitelisting process, a new project page, staking opportunities and the introduction of IDO farming. Future development will bring about the implementation of Polkastarter 3.0, cross-chain token swaps, Dynamic ratio swaps.

3.Introduction/Integration of more services and features: we can see Polkastarters already introducing and integrating new services such as the gaming IDO, introduction of NFTs. With all these we can hope for more in the coming years.

ASSOSCIATED PROJECTS

There’s a long list of associated projects with Polkastarter, either as a result of partnership or tokens within its ecosystem. Some of them are listed below:

ORION PROTOCOL

Polkastarter is associating with Orion protocol so as to use Orion ‘s liquidity boost plug-in to enrich Polkastarter decentralized exchanges with bottomless cross exchange liquidity, in other to provide automated liquidity to token swaps and pool. With this measure in place, Polkastarter guarantees constant activity and liquidity on several ERC-20 token pools.

DECENTRALIZED INFORMATION ASSET (DIA)

Polkastarter associated with Decentralized information asset, in other to be able to decentralize DeFi, and DeFi data sourcing products. With this in place, it will enable sourcing, verification, and the use of data from its network participant within Polkastarter ecosystem. Also this will enable DIA become the main provider of decentralized oracle for ERC-20 prices, which will be used to ensure a higher slippage alert features for Polkastarter.

MOONBEAM NETWORK

The moonbean network is currently working with Polkastarter ecosystem to ensure and bring about a technology that would save time and effort in other to bring better and faster products to users in the Polkastarter ecosystem.

SHYFT NETWORK

This collaboration will bring about a blockchain public protocol that allows encrypted, attested and secure data transfers, while making sure and enabling anyone to develop applications and infrastructure for global citizenship, trusted data and regulatory compliant privacy, this is so as to provide an end to end global white listing solution for all pool creators and to provide new opt in compliance primitives for institutional capital formation and compliant DeFi offers.

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QUESTION 5

MAKE A TECHNICAL ANALYSIS OF THE TOKEN OF THE SELECTED PKLATFORM, AND THEN THROUGH YOUR VALIDATED EXCHANGE ACCOUNT MAKE THE PURCHASE OF THE TOKEN (15USD AS A MINIMUM).

The token selected is POLS token as we all know, the idea is a to make a technical analysis of it, which in turn is expected to lead to its purchase.
The following process and screesnshots will be the guidelines to how I got the token purchased after an analysis of the market.

1.I head over to my TradingView, which is widely accepted to be all traders works station; I click on the Chart Option, which is illustrated by the arrow.

2.It takes me to the Chart interface. Where I input in the name of the token I intend to analyze, as you can see in the screenshot below.

3.I commence my analysis from the highest timeframe to the lowest timeframe; This is so as to give me a clear view of what direction the market is headed. This approach is usually referred to as a top down analysis. What you are seeing me doing here is identifying the swing points, this is so as to define and determine the direction of the market. I want to identify what direction is the market moving and is it in a correction phase or an impulsive movement phase. From my analysis I couldn’t get a clear bias on the monthly time frame through technical analysis, but my fundamental analysis is strong and it tells me POLS token is a good token to invest in. since I couldn’t get a clear bias from the higher timeframe, I will move to a lower time frame when compared to this.

4.I have zoomed in to a smaller timeframe i.e. when compared to the monthly time frame, and here I could have a much better view of different scenarios in the market. Here I could see the market is in an uptrend. Hence, my technical analysis correlates with my fundamental analysis. So what’s next is to find an entry, which was what I did. Price has just recently gotten to a discount price, which is the best level to buy. So this implies that I can buy now. So I will now go to my binance and go purchase at least a minimum of $15USD worth of POLS.

HOW TO PURCHASE POLS TOKEN ON MY CENTRALIZED EXCHANGE.

Here are the steps I took to purchase my POLS token on Binance, a centralized exchange I use;

1.You must ensure you have done your KYC so as to be verified, it is necessary to verify your account to avoid any unforeseen or unwanted situations arising. If your Binance is verified, this is what it will show you

2.Open your centralized exchange, ensure you have a Fiat currency a whatever coin or token its paired with. IN this case, we are purchasing with BTC, so that means we are looking for POLSBTC. So in this situation I go under trade, I click it then brings me to this interface you’re seeing below

From the interface you’re seeing abovethis is wjherre you will buy a token or ccrytpocurrency, all you have to do here is input the amount or quantity you want to buy based on the amount you have available for purchase and once you are done all you have to do is click on buy.

3.Once you have clicked on buy, the quantity you purchase will go straight into your Spot wallet, and then then you have completed your purchase. After then you click the wallet option, then you go under the spot option, and then you can find your cryptocurrency there. It’s that simple. Below is a screenshot to how you an illustration.

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CONCLUSION.

In Conclusion, I must say I am fascinated by the Polkastarter ecosystem. Indeed, this whole process was insightful, and I’m proud to have research this.

In the course of this learning, I figured out Polkastarter has a whole lot of functionalities and purpose it serves in helping start ups develop their full potential. It is aimed at solving a major challenge facing crypto token sales, which is liquidity provision.

I believe we all agree that liquidity is a necessity, without it, it will be almost impossible to have a successful encounter trading or investing in cryptocurrency.

Polkastarter anticipates becoming the largest decentralized token launch pool and auction platform in crypto. They have put into place different mechanism to reward users and I am surely going to invest more into this as soon as possible.

Thank you for giving me an opportunity to research this.

Cc: @allbert

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